Category Archives: Patents

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Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH): experimental zone between State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) and Deutsches Patent-und Markenamt (DPMA)

According to a Joint Statement issued by SIPO and DPMA, the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) experimental zone was set up on Jan. 23, 2012. This program, unlike the PPH between SIPO and USPTO (United States Patent and Trademark Office), only includes general PPH, but not the Patent Cooperation Treaty PPH. Under this initiative, applicants can file their PPH applications to either SIPO or DPMA.

Applicants who want to file the PPH application to SIPO can visit here for further information (Chinese).

Applicants who want to file the PPH application to DPMA can find further information here (English).

This program will continue for two years and will be due on Jan.22, 2014.

Additionally, SIPO set up the PPH experimental zone with the USPTO on Dec. 1, 2011, which will only continue for one year.

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The Other Chinese Patent Development: China’s Autumnal Patent “Hook”

It is 2012, and China’s State Intellectual Property Office (“SIPO”) has once again released its end of the year data on patent filings for the year.  While patent data and scientific citation data suggest that China is on the cusp of becoming an innovative economy, there is another trend that has subsisted for several years:  China’s autumnal upward patent “hook.”

As I have remarked in several conferences during the past two to three years, the data suggests that if patents are a surrogate for innovation activity, one of the most significant factors in China’s innovation efforts are the time of the year:  China innovates in the fall.   February, however, appears to be a slow month for creativity, perhaps due to lack of external pressure (government subsidies, quotas), but also due to the hiatus caused by the lunar new year and the 28 day month.

This past year once again reveals a notable spike for total patent filings at year end.

Compare with 2009 and 2010 data:

This “hook” is especially interesting when we compare the 2009 data with filings at WIPO using the Patent Cooperation Treaty, from the same period:

As China has ramped up its PCT filings, it contrasts dramatically with the total PCT filings as well as the aggregate PCT filings from the rest of the world (less China). See below:

The WIPO data suggests that that the magnitude of this “hook” is largely a Chinese characteristic.   It begins around October and climbs to year end, with a sharper rise than overall PCT filings.

There are other trends suggested by these charts.  In addition to the upward hook, there is also the February downward “spike,” and a mid-year (June/July) “bump”.  The June jump is mild, and looks more like a speed bump than anything else, but its persistence is notable.   Although the new year downward spike is noticeable, patent filings soon resume the year-on-year upward trend shortly thereafter as China continues its efforts to innovate and file more patents.

There are probably externalities that cause these changes.  Patent filings most likely drop significantly when the new calendar year has begun, with new budgets in place and the slowdown in activity with the lunar new year.  Companies that have mid-year fiscal cycles may be inclined to file patents in mid-year, however this mid-year “speed bump” is comparatively small.

The larger autumnal patent hook is probably due to a number of externalities: end of year government subsidies, corporate budgets, quotas for corporate patent filings, and other forms of government and corporate encouragement for enterprises and research institutions to file more patents by the end of the calendar year.

Your thoughts on the causes of this “hook”?  How might it compare to Western companies that are under pressure by their management to file more patents?  Do you think it has any correlation with patent quality? Are there comparisons to be made with other countries?

Written by Mark Cohen with the assistance of Jae Zhou, 2L at Fordham Law.

 

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China’s First Overseas Patent Filer?

Dr. Jin Fuey Moy (梅振魁; Mei Zhenkui, 1862-1924) was not principally an inventor, and his 1908 patent on an enhanced nutcracker for chestnuts  (“Attachment for Nutcrackers”, USPN 883,538) is in fact, the only thing he is known to have patented. He filed for patent protection for the same invention in Canada. Like many men from Taishan County (Toisan) in Guangdong Province, he came to the United States to seek his fortune and never returned to China. Following his elder brothers, he emigrated in 1875, making his way to New York, where he became a domestic servant and was baptized a Christian. Through the beneficence of some well-to-do Methodists who foresaw a missionary career for him, he was sent to New Jersey’s Pennington Seminary and then to Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. He earned his M.D. degree in 1890, the first Chinese to graduate from the school, and one of the first to become a physician in the United States.

In addition to working as a doctor, Moy made his living as an interpreter. He worked for the U.S. Immigration Bureau until he was discharged for allegedly smuggling Chinese immigrants into the United States. But he is most famous as the subject of two Supreme Court cases in which he was charged with misusing the mails to promote the illegal sale of drugs and for writing prescriptions that put heroin and morphine into the hands of drug addicts: United States v. Jin Fuey Moy,  241 U.S. 394 (1916), and Jin Fuey Moy v. United States,  254 U.S. 189 (1920).   The cases helped shape early federal efforts to regulate narcotics and, unlike his patent, are cited frequently to this day.  The Court reversed his conviction in the first case but affirmed in the second; he paid for his crimes with a two-year term in the Atlanta Penitentiary.

It is rare to see a patent, such as this (see also drawing here), which was filed in a foreign country and begins “I…. a subject of the Emperor of China.”   However, the first efforts at a patent law in China were during the Taiping Rebellion (1850-1864), and later at the end of the Qing Dynasty (1889).  Is it possible that there were other patents, filed within China, by “subjects of the Emperor of China.”

The total pendency on this patent appears to have been less than two years from date of application in the United States (applied July 18, 1906 and granted March 31, 1908).  We hope that the USPTO and SIPO can once again achieve this admirable record of keeping patent pendency to below two years.  The patent itself could probably be filed today in China as a utility model patent, as it consists simply of a new apparatus.  We could find no further citation to it in the USPTO database.

Dr. Moy’s biography, together with those of two of his brothers, is the subject of Three Tough Chinamen by Scott D. Seligman, which will be published in Fall, 2012 by Earnshaw Books.

This blog was prepared primarily by Scott Seligman, with some assist on patent law by Mark Cohen.

Thank you, Scott!

 

Related News:

Must Read of the Month: Subject of the Emperor Filed Enhanced Nutcracker Patent in U.S. and Canada 

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Brief recap of “Patents, Trade, and Innovation in China”

Attached is the speech by USPTO Director David Kappos from the joint Fordham/George Washington University conference on IP, innovation and trade issues in China on December 13.   USPTO Director Kappos was introduced by CAFC Chief Judge Rader, himself a veteran of Chinese-IP engagement.  The speech gives a good summary of hte current state of US IP engagement with China from the perspctive of USPTO including the important work of patent cooperation with SIPO which is handled by USPTO directly.
Approximately 125 people attended the program, to discuss the full range of issues, including rule of law and IP protection, patent protection and patent prosecution, IP enforcement, trade related aspects of IP, and constructive proposals for next steps forward.   Attendees included practicing lawyers, government officials, academics, and business people.  The program was intended as a “public discussion” on IP-related issues, in order to enhance substantive engagement on IP issues iwth China.  When asked at the end whether the conference should be held again, there was a unanimous show of hands.  In order to enhance the dialogue the conference was intended as an “off the record” discussion.